Asif Ali Zardari Pakistan’s main opposition party is meeting to pick a new prime minister. The Pakistan People’s Party (PPP), the party of Pakistan’s late former prime minister, Benazir Bhutto, was victorious in Monday’s parliamentary elections. It has agreed to co-operate in government with the opposition PML-N, led by another former PM, Nawaz Sharif. Both […]

President Pervez Musharraf The leaders of the two parties that came out on top in Pakistan’s election meet on Thursday to discuss forming a coalition government that could force President Pervez Musharraf out of power. Musharraf, who took power in a 1999 military coup, is vulnerable to a hostile parliament after his supporters were heavily […]

President Musharraf Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf, says he will not resign, despite opposition winning the country’s parliamentary elections. He told the Wall Street Journal there was a need to move forward to help bring about a stable democratic government in Pakistan. Mr Musharraf said he would try to work with any new government. “I would […]

Opposition parties in Pakistan say they will try to form a coalition after they won enough seats to form a new government. Pervez Musharraf’s political survival hangs in the balance following Monday’s parliamentary elections. A wave of sympathy helped the Pakistan People’s Party of assassinated former Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto emerge as the largest party […]

Pakistan’s general election has been postponed by six weeks until mid-February due to the violence sparked by the assassination of Benazir Bhutto, despite the objection of the two main opposition parties. “In all the four provinces, for some days this election process came to a complete halt,” Chief Election Commissioner Qazi Mohammad Farooq said. “Polling […]

Assassinated: Benazir Bhutto’s killing has led to turmoil Pakistan’s Election Commission will decide on Tuesday whether to postpone the general election – scheduled for January 8 – in the wake of Benazir Bhutto’s assassination, a commission official said today. The election has been thrown into question by the assassination of Bhutto on Thursday and widespread […]

David Miliband: No reason to doubt Pakistan’s Bhutto assassination claims Britain has no reason to doubt the Pakistani government’s account of Benazir Bhutto’s assassination, Foreign Secretary David Miliband has insisted. Supporters of Ms Bhutto dispute claims that an “al Qaida” militant leader was behind Thursday’s attack, instead accusing the authorities of mounting a cover-up. The […]

Shops in Lakarna, Pakistan, were damaged by angry protestors Islamic militants have said they have no link to Benazir Bhutto’s assassination, dismissing government claims that a leader of pro-Taliban forces in Pakistan carried out the suicide attack on the opposition leader. Bhutto’s aides also said they doubted the militant commander Baitullah Mehsud was behind the […]

Benazir Bhutto Benazir Bhutto existed with the realisation that she was a target of the kind of violence that was to end her life. Born in Karachi in June 1953, Ms Bhutto endured the hanging of her father in 1979, periods of exile, two spells as prime minister of Pakistan, arrests and constant threats from […]

Thousands of grieving mourners packed the streets around Benazir Bhutto’s coffin for her funeral procession as 19 people were killed on the streets of Pakistan today. The plain white coffin, draped in the red, green and black flag of her Pakistan People’s Party, was carried in a white ambulance from her ancestral residence in the […]

Pakistani cricketer-turned politician Imran Khan was expelled from the city of Karachi today shortly after arriving on a domestic flight to launch an anti-government campaign, a government official said. Khan, a hugely popular captain of Pakistan’s national cricket team in the late 1980s and early 1990s, heads his own small political party, which is opposed […]

Former Pakistan prime minister Nawaz Sharif is being deported Former Pakistan prime minister Nawaz Sharif was being deported on Monday about four hours after arriving at Islamabad airport, a senior government official said. Several Pakistani television channels reported he was being sent to Saudi Arabia. Some reported he was flown out on board a Pakistan […]

Former prime minister Nawaz Sharif promised to return to Pakistan next month to fight what he called a battle against dictatorship and thwart President General Pervez Musharraf’s bid to extend his rule. Mr Sharif’s would also be up against another ex-premier and rival, Benazir Bhutto. He vowed to return on September 10, risking arrest, after […]